Art & Design BFA - Photography

BFA - Photography

The Photography program emphasizes a conceptual fine art practice through the production of darkroom, digital, and hybrid work. Courses integrate socially situated projects with an understanding of both contemporary and historical visual culture by developing a vocabulary for effective visual communication within the photographic medium. In addition to black & white darkroom and digital color photography, students explore a variety of photographic practices, including large format, studio lighting, alternative processes, and digital imaging. Photography’s paradoxical role as both evidence of the real and window into a manipulated world allows for the recontextualization of cultural, ethical, economic, aesthetic, and psychological themes. Students address the impact of an image-mediated world through performances for the camera and straight documentation, by connecting formal and aesthetic elements to larger theoretical issues, as they establish an authentic sense of self as artists. Courses focus on developing technical and conceptual aspects of the medium, while emphasizing the photograph’s potential to engage meaningfully with ideas and society. The area also encourages the exploration and redefinition of the role of photography within a contemporary fine art context, allowing for experimentation with image appropriation, presentation, and installation, as well as the creation of interdisciplinary collaborations among students, faculty, and the community.

Faculty

Facilities

Undergraduate Facilities:

Photography facilities include a traditional black & white darkroom capable of accommodating 18 students, 5 film processing rooms, a digital imaging and output lab equipped with 10 Macintosh stations and small format printers, a 44” wide-format Epson Stylus Pro 9900 printer, 3 high-resolution scanners, a multi-purpose finishing/dry space, secure display cases with rotating presentations of student work, and two lecture classrooms. In addition, the area has large-format camera and location lighting kits available for checkout by advanced photography students. Undergraduate photography facilities are located in the basement of Mitchell Hall, room B84.

Graduate Facilities:

Graduate photography facilities include a dedicated black & white and alternative process darkroom, digital imaging and output lab with 1 Macintosh station, Epson Stylus Pro 4880 printer, and Epson Expression 10000XL scanner. Graduate photography facilities are located on the 4th floor of the Kenilworth building, a well-equipped studio facility that offers access to a wide range of tools and equipment in each disciplinary area. In 2006, the new Kenilworth building became home to all Art and Design graduate and faculty studios. This is a stand-alone renovated factory building on Milwaukee's East Side, less than a mile from the UWM campus. Kenilworth contains studios for all of the arts, including Dance, Film, Music and Theatre, and includes gallery space, a screening room, various installation sites, and studio facilities. All graduate students are assigned working studio space and receive 24-hour access to this state of the art facility.

For a list of all facilities offered within the Peck School of the Arts - Art & Design departments please visit the Art & Design Facilities page.